Miscellaneous Books and Magazines
I have a growing number of books in my library that don’t really fit into a nice category, yet they are still related to the topics we cover here.
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Title: Beautiful Wounds: A Search for Solace and Light in Washington’s Channeled Scablands by Timothy Connor
ISBN: 978-1682686805
Review: This is a beautiful coffee table stylebook that perfectly shows the intricacy’s of an area that I love, the channeled scablands of Washington. This is the most accurate visual depiction of the region that I have ever seen.
Title: Humboldt’s Travels in Siberia 1837-1842 by John Sinkankas
ISBN: 978-0945005179
Review: This is the fascinating account of three German scientists who traveled 9700 miles into the far reaches of Siberia in 1829 on a rock and mineral hunting expedition at the request of Tar Nicholas I.
Title: Glossary of Obsolete Mineral Names by Peter Bayliss
ISBN: 978-0930259044
Review: This is a fascinating and useful book to have for someone like myself who enjoys reading old rock and mineral books and magazines, as it is a great resource for looking up obsolete nomenclature that isn’t used any longer but still needs to be looked up. It’s also pretty fun to flip though and see what things were called a long time ago.
Title: Rocks & Minerals Washington State Issue July/August 1991 (Vol. 66, No. 4)
ISBN: N/A
Review: If you are a serious collector of Washington State rocks and minerals than you will want to locate a copy of this magazine, it’s outstanding! It has articles by a number of well-known collectors and authors such as Lanny Ream, Rudy Tschernich, Raymond Lasmanis and many more. It has articles about collecting in the Wenatchee National Forest, Washington Mineral Index, Autunite Localities of NE Washington, Zeolites of Washington, Petrified Wood from Washington and Collecting Sites for Agate in Washington State. Some of the information and locations mentioned in the magazine are not found anywhere else to the best of my knowledge.
Title: Rock Treasures of Oregon by Hans Gamma
ISBN: N/A
Review: This book is truly a beautiful work of art. I would say that this would qualify as a coffee table book since it’s mostly just photos of different material that can be found in Oregon, but it is presented in a beautiful way, and it is also really nice to have the common names and photos for all these different types of material found in Oregon. I hope to add the rest of Hans Gammas books to my collection someday.
Title: Jasper & Agates from the California Coast Ranges by Hans Gamma
ISBN: N/A
Review: This is my second book by Hans Gamma, and it does not disappoint! This is perhaps the very best documentation of jaspers and agates found in the Coast Range of California, and it showcases over 320 beautiful jaspers and agates from 41 different locations, along with some site photos as well. Before buying this book, I had no idea of the diversity the region had to offer.
Title: Picture Jaspers from the Northwest by Hans Gamma
ISBN: N/A
Review: Undoubtedly, one of the greatest collections of photos and information about picture jasper of the Pacific Northwest. The photos are nothing short of incredible, and the recorded oral history of the different locations and the people mining it is a treasure. The book was never really intended to be an identification guide, but it could serve as one if you’re trying to match up that mystery jasper you have to some known specimens.
Mineral Digest
The Journal of Mineralogy
Mineral Digest The Journal of Mineralogy published 8 volumes in the 1970s, but most of the actual books have no published dates. The first reference to the printing comes in volume 2 when they said it was published quarterly and then in volume 4 they list the publishing date as “Winter 1972”, I will use this reference point in volume 4 to date the issues.
It’s important to point out that many of these books had poor glue used in the binding of them which has resulted in some pages and covers coming loose, this seems to be a well-known issue with the printing of them.
Each digest contains a handful of very well written in depth articles by well known (at the time) authors and experts. Every issue is printed in full color on high gloss paper, which in a way almost makes them more like a small coffee table book than a magazine digest.
Title: Mineral Digest The Journal of Mineralogy Vol. 1 Summer 1972
ISBN: N/A
Review: This first volume was an excellent read and contained articles from John Sinkankas and Frederick Pough and many more, but those were the two who stood out to me. It had a number of really great articles that I enjoyed reading, such as Minerals on Postage Stamps, Color in Minerals The secret of Nature’s palette and Quartz A Mineral Digest classes condensation. All of these articles were accompanied by beautiful photos and lovely 1970s style layout. The articles walked a fine line between the technical and writing for the layperson.
Title: Mineral Digest The Journal of Mineralogy Vol. 2 Fall 1972
ISBN: N/A
Review: Similar to volume one, this volume had a number of articles written by some very well-known and respected writers. The two articles that stood out the most to me were Moon Rock by John Sinkankas and Minerals from Tsumb by Jay Wollin. The Moon Rocks article was interesting to me since the field of selenology is so advanced these days but back in the time that this digest was released we were just in the process of retrieving and disturbing the lunar samples from the Apollo program so to see beautiful thin sections of lunar samples must have been spectacular at the time. I would say this is worth adding to the library, as it truly captures an interesting time in the world of mineralogy.
Title: Mineral Digest The Journal of Mineralogy Vol. 3 Winter 1972
ISBN: N/A
Review: I would say this issue was acceptable but fell a little short of my expectation after reading the first two which were very well written with excellent subjects to discuss and event the photos were lacking. I think if it was the winter of 1972, and I received this in the mail, I’m not sure if I would continue buying these.
Title: Mineral Digest The Journal of Mineralogy Vol. 4 Spring 1973
ISBN: N/A
Review: This volume contained a number of very well-written and interesting articles, from the 601 carrot Lesotho diamond to Great Jewel Robberies: Thieves, Time & Places it had a lot of really well-written articles. These books are a time capsule sorts, you get to look back on what people found interesting in the world of minerals at the time and touch on topics I have never thought about before, such as the article Minerals in Advertising.